Guns n' Boys Book 1 Part 1 (35 page)

“I’ll be guarded. I’ll
have to take care of her, and there would be children.” It was too overwhelming
for Seth to even comprehend, and he had to sniff again.

Domenico sighed and
raised his hand to stroke his thumb over Seth’s cheekbone. “Everyone’s got
responsibilities. We need to cope with that.”

Seth swallowed and
slowly nodded. He was afraid to even think of Dom’s ‘responsibilities’. His
heart pounded as he watched Dom’s amber eyes hypnotizing him in the darkness.

Slowly, Dom cupped
Seth’s face in both hands and pulled it down for a slow, chaste kiss. His mouth
was bitter with the taste of cigarettes but warm, with an underlying sweetness.
Seth sniffed once more before giving in to the caress and reciprocating it
gently, with just his lips, salty with the tears that had managed to slip down
his cheeks before.

“Stop crying. Men
shouldn’t cry,” whispered Domenico against his mouth, and Seth felt a shiver go
down his neck both from the closeness and a cool breeze that must have come
through the window.

Wait.
What? Seth looked to the balcony. He remembered closing it
earlier, and he would have heard Dom going out when he was in bed. Besides,
nights were too cold for sitting outside now. He didn’t have the time to even
start a new thought when his knees gave up at the impact of something hitting
them from the back. The world slowed down, and as he was falling down to the
floor, there was a metallic glint in the darkness and a snap when something hit
a wall behind where he stood less than a second ago. Dom made a rapid move, and
something smashed, shattering into a million little glass pieces.

Seth groaned at the pain
of hitting his skull against the floor, but time to comprehend what was
happening rapidly shrunk when someone yanked his leg and dragged him along the
floor. None of Dom’s lessons were kicking in. It wasn’t combat, it was chaos.
Survival instinct pulled Seth into action the moment he saw a knife aiming for
his thigh, and he kicked the attacker’s wrist. The man screamed, but Seth’s
blood froze when he realized the knife hadn’t dropped to the floor. It was
attached to a stub where the man’s hand used to be.

The grunting, the squeaking
of shoes all too close to his head, and even the moving air all faded in
comparison to the blade aimed at him by the attacker, whose face was still in
the shadow. Seth gagged with panic at the sound of unfamiliar words hurled at
him, but they only enforced his need to fight by any means necessary. It was
the same language his kidnappers used.

He sat up to smash the
man’s face with his elbow, but it ended up in a meeting with the blade. Red hot
pain slashed through his arm, but there was no time to ponder that. Seth went
straight for what he perceived as the man’s weak spot and grabbed the stub,
squeezing it to send him into a world of pain.

A sharp cry rang in
Seth’s ears, and as the man on top of him bent in half, he finally saw a young,
handsome face, now contorted in agony.

Domenico’s voice tore
through the haze clouding Seth’s mind. “Break his fucking neck!”

What Seth did manage was
to pull at the handle of the knife attached to the man’s stub, and it got the
blade flopping. No less sharp, but now a lot less efficient as a weapon. The
attacker hissed again when Seth dug his nails into the soft stub, focused only
on survival. Wet heat covered his stomach and the stench of urine overpowered
the smell of blood. Seconds later, Seth was on top of the man, grabbing his
head, but it wasn’t good enough with his other hand still gripping the stub. In
one frightening moment, rough fingertips dug into his face, climbing up his
cheek to reach the eye. That sent Seth’s senses into a frenzy and instead of trying
to break the guy’s neck, he pulled up his head and repeatedly smashed it into
the floor. The dull sound of skull thudding against tiles lasted until Seth
heard a crack, and the man stopped moving.

With his pulse beating
furiously in his temples, Seth raised his head to look at the shadows in the
living room. Breath caught in his throat when Domenico dodged an acrobatic kick
by just a fraction of a second before shooting up like he were shot from a
ballista and smashing his elbow into the other man’s jaw. The advantage of
height he had over his opponent only made the smack more powerful.

Seth ripped the knife
off the dead man’s arm with the bandage still attached and got to his feet,
spurred on by concentrated adrenaline. Blood dripped down his arm, but pain
wasn’t even reaching his brain, all focus set on being of help to Dom.

The two figures, one
wiry and broad-shouldered, the other smaller and stocky, were now locked in a
furious dance of death where one wrong move could result in a stab in the gut.
Seth watched with his lips salty from sweat and took a step closer, attempting
to corner the assailant.

“Stay back!” gasped
Domenico.

Seth clutched the knife
in his hand, but did as he was told, trusting Dom knew what was best. He had
to. What was the other choice? Trying to act like a hero when it could lead to
causing more damage than help? The last thing he wanted was to get in the way
or hurt Dom by accident.

With growing
fascination, he watched the two men locked in a deadly embrace, almost
immobile, their muscles twitching in response to one another’s movements. Then,
with a vicious move of his head, Domenico head-butted his opponent, breaking
his focus for just enough time to scoot down, reaching for a piece of glinting
metal. Seth paled. It was a machete.

Seth’s eyes opened
wider, but before he could cheer for Dom to slash the motherfucker in two, the
man kicked the blade away and smashed his foot into Dom’s side a fraction of a
second later. A crackle in Dom’s body made Seth take a step forward again, but
he felt as if he were made out of adrenaline, sweat, and stone. Each force and
emotion was driving him in a different direction. What if Dom was wrong? What
if the man was too much, and Seth should approach and help? He was stranded on
the outskirts of a deadly fight, and even with a knife in his hand, he couldn’t
decide what to do.

Steel-willed or not,
Domenico fell to the floor, opening his mouth in silent shock. His gaze moved
between Seth and the long blade, claimed by the other man with a groan of
satisfaction. Seth gasped and without a second thought, threw the knife he had
in his hand to Dom, praying it wouldn’t miss and stab Dom by accident. There
was no time to waste.

It spiraled through the
air, but it was falling too far from Domenico. Seth’s stomach sank. In the very
last fraction of a second, Domenico gathered his strength and reached forward.
He let out a hiss as his fingers caught the blade, the machete already swishing
through the air. Seth gasped and took a step forward, but if he approached
them, he might end up being the attacker’s human shield instead of Dom’s
savior.

In the darkness, it was
hard to spot the move, but Domenico managed to turn the knife in his hand and
used it to stop the huge blade from dismembering his hand. His leg bent, aiming
for the attacker’s feet, but the man leaped back, defying the laws of physics,
and without leaving a second to spare, kicked Dom right in the face. Domenico
grunted, but then rapidly pushed forward and slashed at the man’s ankle. There
was a silent scream and thud when the Chinese man dropped to the floor. His
fate was sealed. In just a few precise movements, Dom stepped on the machete
and turned his opponent’s head. The stomach-turning crack made Seth’s last meal
go up in his throat, but the body did not move.

Only now Seth realized
he was wheezing, so he took a deep breath tainted by the smell of blood and
urine. He couldn’t move as he watched Dom spit blood to the floor with the
bottom half of his face covered in red.

With the knife still in
his hand, Domenico walked past Seth and looked down at the other man. “Get me
my handcuffs,” he muttered.

Seth swallowed. “He’s
dead,” he wanted to say, but only managed a whisper.

“He’s not. Handcuffs.”
Domenico let out a sigh and squatted by the body with a low wince. “Fucker
pissed himself.”

Seth looked down at his
own stained clothes, but fetched the handcuffs without a word. As soon as he
gave them to Dom, he turned on the lights. The moment the room was illuminated,
he wished it wasn’t. Light revealed a scene of pure gore. Dom must have cut the
other man’s tendons, because his feet were unnaturally bent. Just like his
head, face squished against the floor.

Domenico sighed and
pulled the unconscious man’s hands back, only to groan when he saw the stump.
“Okay. Rope, that idiot lost his brain when he lost his hand, apparently.” He
seemed to be more concerned about the piss and blood soaking into the floor
than anything else. He even spat at one red spot and wiped it off with the edge
of his shirt.
Thank God for tiles
.

Rope wasn’t hard to
find. It hung prominently on the wall, left by the apartment owner for their
fun. Its use wasn’t about to provide fun for anyone. “Dom?” Seth managed in a
louder voice.

“Yeah?” Domenico worked
the rope like it was making scrambled eggs. Easy-peasy despite the blood
dripping from his fingers. He wasn’t shaking. He wasn’t frightened or
disgusted. More pissed off than anything else.

Seth’s heart on the
other hand was on a marathon to nowhere. Running too quick to be able to make
it to the finish line. “Are you all right?” Seth approached him slowly, now
that adrenaline oozed out of his body, his legs became wobbly. Dom’s face
looked like it needed medical attention, but there was too much blood for Seth
to tell. Not that he knew anything about dealing with wounds.

Dom actually turned his
head to look at him with a slight frown. There was blood already coagulating
around his nostrils and traces of it running all the way to his chin. He looked
like he had just finished feasting on a raw, fresh kill. “Why?”

Seth swallowed. Was it a
stupid question? He reached out to Dom’s face, but pulled his hand back when he
noticed it was covered in blood. “I— Never mind, you seem fine,” he uttered,
completely out of his depth. Pain in his arm now kicked in with full force,
throbbing with a stinging heat.

“And you? That was
pretty good,” said Dom, looking at the unconscious man at his feet. “I should
make the fucker clean this all up first thing when he wakes up.”

“I did?” Seth looked
down at the bloodied stump and bruised face of the young Asian man. “It’s him,
isn’t it? He lost his hand for my finger.” It wasn’t a question at this point,
and Seth spat at the enemy.

“Doesn’t matter. He
deserved whatever he got.” Domenico started searching the man’s pockets.

Seth went over to the
dead man and had a better look at his face. Bile rose in his throat when he saw
a face he’d recognize anywhere. “It’s him. The guy who ordered to cut my finger
off. How the fuck did they get here?” He tapped his foot on the floor, annoyed
at the blood that wouldn’t stop dripping from his arm.

“Clean your wound first,
and I’ll sew it up,” muttered Domenico, fishing out a folded piece of paper,
which, miraculously, wasn’t soiled.

Seth turned his head to
Dom in panic and looked at the long slash on his arm. “No, no, no, it’s fine!
It just needs a bandage.” Oh God, he didn’t want home-grown surgery. Stumps
like the guy on the floor had came from that.

“I’m not discussing
this.” Domenico opened his mouth to say something more when the fallen guy
stirred with a grunt of pain. “For fuck’s sake...”

The man’s eyes slowly
opened, and when Dom silently gestured for the knife, Seth passed it to him
without a word. For a moment, he considered going to the bathroom under the
pretense of cleaning his wound, but he had to stop chickening out.

The guy let out a shaky
breath. “My father...?”

“Dead,” said Domenico in
a voice devoid of emotion.

The man pursed his lips
and took a deep breath through his nose. When he tried to spit, Dom effortlessly
stopped him by hitting his chin.

“Who’s Mr. Tropico?”
asked Domenico, showing him the unfolded piece of paper. It was a printed out
e-mail.

“Fuck you,” was all the
reply he got, and Seth wasn’t even all that surprised.

Domenico sighed. “Look,
how much flesh do you still have on your body? We can either carve that
information out of you or you’ll just tell us.”

A shiver ran down Seth’s
spine, and going to the bathroom didn’t seem like such a cowardly prospect
anymore. He had to clean his wound at some point…

“I don’t know who he
is,” the man spoke, wheezing slightly. “It was anonymous. Someone in your
family must hate you.” He bared his bloodied teeth with satisfaction.

Domenico crooked his
head. “What about
your
Family?”

The man squinted at him.
“It will thrive even with us dead, it was a personal vendetta.
Your
Family is rotting from the inside,” he rasped and, to Seth’s horror, grinned,
showing off a set of bloodied teeth.

“And you pissed yourself
like a little girl.”

The smile was instantly
gone, and the man snapped, “And you fuck your brother, fag.”